Course One: Wilton Cake Decorating Basics: Lesson Two

     Our homework for class this week was to bake a cake by using bake even strips or using a cake leveler after it's cooled down, and then ice the cake using the techniques which also included the paper towel technique on our cake.
     I wanted a even cake. But I didn't want to use the cake leveler, since it's such a waste of cake. And I didn't want to buy the bake even strips by Wilton. So instead, I searched Pinterest to find ideas.
     I got an old bath towel and cut about 2 inches off of the long length part.

Then I went along with the steps that you do with bake even strips, I got cold water on them, wet, but not dripping wet, and double knotted them around my cake  pans, you may need to cut yours a bit thicker if you cake pan is taller.

Ta da! Now stick it in the oven, but don't let any of the towel touch the bottom of your oven.

I was very impressed. I've never had such an even cake! If only I'd learn this trick earlier. I don't think I'm ever going without my old bath towel strips again! ;)

SUCH A DIFFERENCE!

Mrs. Cristol taught us to make a "dam" with a piping bag and a coupler without a tip. So basically you're turning the turntable while piping on the outer end of the circle, it's just like tracing a circle.

Then spatula some icing or filling in the middle.

All iced up and ready to go to class. (Notice how "even" it looks. Those strips really work!)

 

Today in class there was less talk, more work. Mrs.Cristol was putting our skills to the test by seeing if we had really learned from her demonstration in class on how to ice a cake last week, if she corrected the icing on your cake, and came up to fix it for you, you'll know you did something wrong. Surprisingly I was the only one with the cake that she didn't fix.

 

One of the students put their cake on a can pan with foil, Mrs. Cristol explained that it would be very difficult to decorate on a cake pan, so she went out to by a pack of cake boards for it.

I thought you might find it interesting to see how a Cake Lifter works.

Mrs.Cristol said to scoop it under the cake, let gravity do it's magic;

then when it's on the cake lifter, bring the board under it and let gravity do it's magic again. And there you have it! :)

We moved on to learning some basic piping:

For the dots you hold the tip slightly above the surface, pressure, let go of pressure without moving, then lightly round it off, pressure, no pressure, round off.

And then moved on to the art of clear piping gel.

I wanted to make a fish cake, So in our practice board there's three basic outlines:

A cupcake,  a burger and a fish.

 We traced it on a sheet of parchment paper on top of the practice board

Then, flipped it over and pressed it lightly onto the cake and lightly pulled it off.

I'm not sure if you can see it, but the piping gel is on my cake and I'm ready to start on the fish.

The basic pattern was to practice on the practice board, then once you felt comfortable, do it on your cake.

Believe it or not, it actually took pretty much the whole two hours to finish the cake. :)

Mrs.Cristol has been joking that I'm going to be the next teacher at Michael's Craft Store because one of my classmates was having trouble getting down piping dots, so I stopped what I was doing to help her and she got it after a few trys :)

 

Thanks for stopping by! Have a fantasic week!

 

-Cake Crumb Girl